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Saturday, October 30, 2010

Shaking the Money Tree

OMG! Morrie did see this post!! Pls see the comments below!! Check out www.warshawski.com for more info on Morrie's book.
I read the book Shaking the Money Tree by Morrie Warshawski - rather I gave it a detailed browsing. Here are some of the topics I found interesting in it:

The initial section that Morrie briefly concentrates on: Text Color

  • Mission (Why you want to be a filmmaker? What do you want to accomplish?),
  • Vision (Paint a future vision...) and
  • Values (your core values which you want to hold at all costs)

seem to have sneaked in from career building camp; none the less it is valuable if it is your career. In a sense mission and vision will keep you motivated while values will throw you a guiding light.

I liked the tips on setting easy wins and long term goals. If you are serious you could try to create

  • "5 easy/quick wins" and
  • "5 bold moves".

I agree that these are important for your morale.


Anyways, I thought the next section was more valuable to me... it is where Morrie talks about the pitch.

  • Create an elevator pitch and polish it; and practise delivering it too. You should be able to describe the genre, visual appeal and probably throw a couple of similar movie names to convey what you have in mind.
  • Competition: Pick at least 5 movies that are similar to your movie. Differentiate your move along the following areas:
    • Style
    • Content
    • Timing
    • Depth
    • Audience
  • Target Audience: You have to determine to whom you want to target your movie to. "Everyone" is not the right answer. Think along the lines of demographics and psychographics. You could try to define the target audience and also who the audience is not. Here are the broad audience types:
    • Geography
    • Age
    • Gender
    • Race
    • Religion
    • Income level
    • Educational background
    • Political affiliation
    • Occupation
    • Lifestyle
    • Hobbies
    • Interests
  • Distribution: What is your strategy? Think how you would exploit the following channels:
    • Festivals
    • Theatrical
    • Cable TV
    • Public Television (local and national)
    • Video and DVD
    • Educational markets and libraries
    • Internet
  • Team: Is the core team experienced enough to produce this movie?
  • Schedule: Rough time line with major milestones. When do you expect to finish the movie etc.
  • Budget: You need to have the regular budget and the "scrappy" version of the same. The scrappy version is for your eyes only and to be used when you are running out of money during production. Also pick a few similar movies and see how the dollars were spread. This would serve as a quick validation on what you have arrived at.

3 comments:

Vimala Arul said...

will be glad to see the movies you shoot.

Morrie Warshawski said...

Thanks for the careful "browsing" of my book! Please let your readers know that they can can find out more about SHAKING THE MONEY TREE at my website www.warshawski.com, and that if they mention your blog I will take an additional 10% off the already reduced price!
Best,
Morrie

Hugh Chatfield said...

Took his workshop a week back and bought his books. Found quite a bit of useful things to think about and do - some I would never have thought of - esp. those related to internet based fund raising.

Will be harvesting my notes and the books very shortly.

Cheers...Hugh
Follow me on Hugh's World @ http://hugh-chatfield.com